3 things that are faster than light
1. COSMIC INFLATION :-
This is a hypothetical moment in which the
universe became suddenly bigger. For this
to have happened, space-time must have
expanded at many times the speed of light.
no physical laws are violated because the
cosmic speed limit only applies to things that
move through space-time, not to the movement
of space-time. It’s unclear whether inflation
happened. nevertheless, the expansion of space
is making distant galaxies appear to recede from
us at velocities several times that of light.
2. CERENKOV RADIATION
The optical equivalent of a sonic boom,
cerenkov radiation occurs when light
passes from vacuum into a denser
medium, such as water or glass, it slows
down. High-energy particles travelling in
the same direction often do not slow down
as quickly as the light and find themselves
travelling faster. they create a shock
wave that pushes light out of the way. It
is common to see this cerenkov radiation
as a ghostly blue glow around nuclear
reactors that are covered in water.
3. TACHYONS
This is a generic name for any particle that
travels faster than the speed of light. It is a
hypothetical idea that was given its present
name in 1967. A particle that travelled faster
than the speed of light would violate the
known laws of physics unless it had some
extremely peculiar properties. If such a particle
were possible, it would be able to travel
backwards in time, and could never slow down
to travel below the speed of light. sounds
exciting, but none have ever been found.
WILL IT EVER BE POSSIBLE TO TELEPORT A HUMAN ?
As air travel gets ever more tedious,
the idea of simply popping into a booth
on one side of the world and reappearing
on the other gets ever more appealing.
standing in the way of this, however, are
a tremendous number of technical issues.
It may be possible to teleport a very small
item, such as a virus, but for anything
larger there are physical limits that mean
it would be necessary to do the transfer
particle by particle.
even leaving aside our inability to
manipulate matter accurately at that level,
the sheer size of the problem is phenomenal.
A human body contains around 7x1027 atoms
(where 1027 is 1 with 27 zeros following it).
Imagine you could process a trillion atoms
a second. It would still take 7x1015 seconds
to scan a whole person. that’s 200 million
years! there’s also a huge amount of data
to be transmitted with an associated energy
cost. A conservative estimate puts this
at around 10^12 gigawatt hours. the UK’s
power station capacity last year was 83
gigawatts. so teleporting one human would
tie up the UK power supply for more than a
million years.
even if it were feasible, sensible travellers
would hesitate to make use of a teleportation
device. Bear in mind that it would not move
you from A to B. Instead it would strip you
down, atom by atom, disintegrating your
body, and building an identical copy. Yes, the
teleported ‘you’ would seem the same to
everyone else – with the same thoughts and
memories. But it would be a copy and you
would be destroyed. even airport security
isn’t that bad.
Could phages be
used as an
alternative to
antibiotics?
They already are, to some extent.
Bacteriophages, or ‘phages’ for
short, are viruses that target
specific bacteria. the virus
penetrates the bacterial cell
membrane and hijacks its dnA
machinery to produce more copies
of itself. this eventually ruptures
the bacterium, killing it and
releasing more phages.
Phage therapy is actually at least
90 years old. it was used
extensively in russia during the
Cold war, when access to western
antibiotics was limited. Phages get
around the problem of bacteria
evolving resistance because they
are constantly evolving themselves.
the downside is that you need a
very specific phage to target every
different bacterial strain. in
practice, this means administering
a cocktail of different phages and
updating the recipe every few
months. Phage therapy is currently
only approved in russia and
Georgia, but interest in other
countries is currently soaring.
Is it best to charge your
mobile battery from
empty or half-full?
Nickel-based batteries were blighted by the
‘memory effect’, and would lose capacity
unless regularly discharged completely.
Most phones nowadays have lithium
batteries, and these do not suffer from the
memory effect. in fact, it is good for them if
you top the batteries up rather than deplete
them completely. therefore, it’s best to
charge your phone from half-full.
Temporary tattoo to
measure blood glucose
It seems tattoos may no longer be the
preserve of footballers, rappers and
Shoreditch hipsters. A group at the
University of California has created
a temporary paper-based tattoo that
measures blood glucose levels using a
mild electric shock. The technology could
replace the current finger-prick method.
today update
1. COSMIC INFLATION :-
This is a hypothetical moment in which the
universe became suddenly bigger. For this
to have happened, space-time must have
expanded at many times the speed of light.
no physical laws are violated because the
cosmic speed limit only applies to things that
move through space-time, not to the movement
of space-time. It’s unclear whether inflation
happened. nevertheless, the expansion of space
is making distant galaxies appear to recede from
us at velocities several times that of light.
2. CERENKOV RADIATION
The optical equivalent of a sonic boom,
cerenkov radiation occurs when light
passes from vacuum into a denser
medium, such as water or glass, it slows
down. High-energy particles travelling in
the same direction often do not slow down
as quickly as the light and find themselves
travelling faster. they create a shock
wave that pushes light out of the way. It
is common to see this cerenkov radiation
as a ghostly blue glow around nuclear
reactors that are covered in water.
3. TACHYONS
This is a generic name for any particle that
travels faster than the speed of light. It is a
hypothetical idea that was given its present
name in 1967. A particle that travelled faster
than the speed of light would violate the
known laws of physics unless it had some
extremely peculiar properties. If such a particle
were possible, it would be able to travel
backwards in time, and could never slow down
to travel below the speed of light. sounds
exciting, but none have ever been found.
WILL IT EVER BE POSSIBLE TO TELEPORT A HUMAN ?
As air travel gets ever more tedious,
the idea of simply popping into a booth
on one side of the world and reappearing
on the other gets ever more appealing.
standing in the way of this, however, are
a tremendous number of technical issues.
It may be possible to teleport a very small
item, such as a virus, but for anything
larger there are physical limits that mean
it would be necessary to do the transfer
particle by particle.
even leaving aside our inability to
manipulate matter accurately at that level,
the sheer size of the problem is phenomenal.
A human body contains around 7x1027 atoms
(where 1027 is 1 with 27 zeros following it).
Imagine you could process a trillion atoms
a second. It would still take 7x1015 seconds
to scan a whole person. that’s 200 million
years! there’s also a huge amount of data
to be transmitted with an associated energy
cost. A conservative estimate puts this
at around 10^12 gigawatt hours. the UK’s
power station capacity last year was 83
gigawatts. so teleporting one human would
tie up the UK power supply for more than a
million years.
even if it were feasible, sensible travellers
would hesitate to make use of a teleportation
device. Bear in mind that it would not move
you from A to B. Instead it would strip you
down, atom by atom, disintegrating your
body, and building an identical copy. Yes, the
teleported ‘you’ would seem the same to
everyone else – with the same thoughts and
memories. But it would be a copy and you
would be destroyed. even airport security
isn’t that bad.
Could phages be
used as an
alternative to
antibiotics?
They already are, to some extent.
Bacteriophages, or ‘phages’ for
short, are viruses that target
specific bacteria. the virus
penetrates the bacterial cell
membrane and hijacks its dnA
machinery to produce more copies
of itself. this eventually ruptures
the bacterium, killing it and
releasing more phages.
Phage therapy is actually at least
90 years old. it was used
extensively in russia during the
Cold war, when access to western
antibiotics was limited. Phages get
around the problem of bacteria
evolving resistance because they
are constantly evolving themselves.
the downside is that you need a
very specific phage to target every
different bacterial strain. in
practice, this means administering
a cocktail of different phages and
updating the recipe every few
months. Phage therapy is currently
only approved in russia and
Georgia, but interest in other
countries is currently soaring.
Is it best to charge your
mobile battery from
empty or half-full?
Nickel-based batteries were blighted by the
‘memory effect’, and would lose capacity
unless regularly discharged completely.
Most phones nowadays have lithium
batteries, and these do not suffer from the
memory effect. in fact, it is good for them if
you top the batteries up rather than deplete
them completely. therefore, it’s best to
charge your phone from half-full.
Temporary tattoo to
measure blood glucose
preserve of footballers, rappers and
Shoreditch hipsters. A group at the
University of California has created
a temporary paper-based tattoo that
measures blood glucose levels using a
mild electric shock. The technology could
replace the current finger-prick method.
today update
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